North Korea university reaches out to Concordia in Portland

View full sizeJames KimTwelve years ago, James Kim sat in a prison cell in North Korea's capital, Pyongyang, writing his last will and testament.

This week, Kim visited Portland as president of Pyongyang University of Science and Technology and signed what is billed as the first pact of its kind between a U.S. and North Korean university. Under the agreement, the Pyongyang institution could one day exchange students with Concordia University in Portland.

That outcome might seem far-fetched, given that North Korea and the United States lack diplomatic relations. But Kim, 74, has overcome immense odds before.

"First I would like to have Concordia students come to our university in Pyongyang," Kim said Thursday. The North Korean institution, the first privately funded university ever allowed in the isolated nation, will launch classes in April, he said.

The link formed Thursday augments unusually close relations between North Korea and inhabitants of a U.S. state. Oregon-based humanitarian organizations Mercy Corps and Medical Teams International are known for relief operations inside the reclusive nation. North Korean diplomats and technical experts make occasional low-profile visits to Oregon.

Thursday's deal was brokered by the Wholistic Peace Institute, an Oregon organization working to reduce world violence, newly housed at Concordia's Northeast Portland campus.

Gary Spanovich, the institute's executive director, said the North Korean university will initially need English teachers, as classes there will be conducted in English. North Koreans who ultimately come to Portland could study English, business and market economics, public administration and conflict resolution, he said.

Kim, a longtime U.S. businessman, emigrated from South Korea to the United States in the 1970s. He has harbored the dream of bringing Western education to the North, according to a detailed report last September in Fortune magazine by veteran foreign correspondent Bill Powell.

Powell chronicled Kim's efforts to start the university and to host an adjoining industrial park, "bizarre as it sounds" in North Korea, that would emulate Palo Alto in California or Boston's Route 128. Powell traced Kim's background and business dealings, but was not quite able to pin down how he was able to persuade North Korea to admit a university funded by evangelical churches worldwide.

As Kim tells the story, North Korea's benevolence harks back to his 40-day prison stint in 1998, when he faced a potential death sentence. He says his humanitarian work at the time led to his arrest as an accused spy.

In the will he wrote in his cell, he says, he directed that his body be donated to the Pyongyang Medical School for research. He added that he wanted to donate his organs for transplants, and said he didn't want a funeral.

Kim says the sentiment melted hearts in President Kim Jong Il's autocratic administration. Upon his release, James Kim declined to criticize the regime, citing his Christian philosophies and desire to work for peace.

Before then, Kim had built a privately funded university in northeastern China, the Yanbian University of Science and Technology, that thrives today and serves as a model for the new institution in North Korea.

The university in Yanji, China, along the North Korean border, has 1,750 students. Kim expects the university in Pyongyang to enroll about 600 graduate students taught by an international faculty. Subjects will include a degree in industrial management, a communist euphemism for an MBA.

In Portland this week, Kim preached in the chapel at Concordia, a private Lutheran university. He signed an additional cooperative agreement between Concordia and his Chinese university. He attended a peace class, briefly addressing students.